Boys camping trip to Coolendel

A couple of weeks ago Dunc took Arthur and Barney on a big boys' camping trip with Jon Perry, Arthur's godfather. They went to a beautiful riverside campsite, called Coolendel (about 3.5 hrs South of here), which had been highly recommended by Jules and Lenka. They had an amazing weekend jumping from 'jump rock', riding the rapids (albeit small!) on inflatable beds and floating about 2km downstream on their inflatable beds. They were joined on the campsite by huge wombats, wallabies, countless birds - fairy wrens, lyre birds, kookaburras. They even managed to squeeze in a bit of 'trick-or-treating' with other camping kids, having picked the Halloween weekend to go away. A few snaps for you to enjoy.

Iona walking!!

I always thought people were making it up when they said that their offspring had taken the first steps on the 1st birthday - however, in Iona's case this is exactly what happened!! Her first steps were to Duncan (typical!) and it has taken a couple of weeks to finally get film of her in action. Here she is in all her glory.

Sunday was the day of Iona's 'party' shared with Maggie - aged two on Monday. Iona was not shy to stuff her first ever cupcake down her neck and I had worried that she might not like it!! She even took her first steps (to Daddy!) on her actual birthday. Since then she has tried a couple of times and decided to crawl with her bottom up in the air instead of her usual flying pace on all fours. Won't be long before she is truly up and about.

A very exciting day for Tenzin who, thanks to his 'like-a-bike', has mastered riding a real bike with no training wheels - aged 3 yrs and 9 mths!!!

Sat 17th October was Iona's 1st birthday. We decided to celebrate the following day with friends Kirsten and Tom (+ 4 kids) and Dee and Tim (+ 4 kids) as it would be Maggie's 2nd birthday on the Monday 19th Oct. On Iona's actual birthday we had great fun dressing her up in her first ever fairy outfit, sent by Gummy and Gumpa. She wasn't too impressed but the photos will have to come out for her 21st!

The favourite photo of 2009 - our two oldest "Swamp Monsters"!!!

Tenzin on a mission at The Basin.